Community Resilience through the Influence of Grassroots Initiatives

Abstract

The paper shows that the importance of German and Greek initiatives has risen significantly in the last years. The German movements are mostly reflected in the harsh criticism of political undertakings; many focusing on pro-environment action, as well as a fight for human equality and the inclusiveness of the society in need. Conversely, the Greek solidarity movements often act to diminish post-crisis austerity symptoms and battle against the ubiquitous failure of politicians in Greece to respect and provide fundamental human rights and needs. It becomes clear that German initiatives are prone to criticise socio-political governances, as well as environmentally-related actions to succeed and achieve their goals, whereas Greek initiatives are bowed to tackle the occurrence of socio-economic and political difficulties themselves directly.